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PSP Ad Draws Charges of Racism
Lord Kano writes "The Guardian Unlimited is reporting that a new Sony ad for the upcoming white PSP has caused an uproar because of claims that it carries racist overtones. The ad depicts a white woman, clad all in white, grabbing the face of a black model in a dominating pose." From the article: "It's questionable whether the world is ready to explore themes of race and domination in the context of a videogame console ad. Although not as wilfully controversial as Benetton's infamous 'United Colours' campaign, many viewers will be unwilling or unable to decode the imagery until it becomes about two different colours of plastic." What do you think about this latest in a long line of PSP ads of questionable taste?
I like how a Keith Stuart (a games blogger from the UK Guardian) can comment on the state of racial tension in two countries he doesn't live in.
In America, it's called "racism." In Europe, it's just people trying to protect their culture. To me, it's called "ignorance." Ignorance is everywhere no matter how hard we try to eradicate it.
America's quick to cry foul play because of our recent history, yes. It's seen as very important to be equal opportunity here. Do I walk down the street and feel conscience of other people's skin color? No. Some people in America still might but it's only due to their ignorance. I've only seen someone oppressed once because of their skin color and it was because I was in Alabama for a wedding and my Indian friend was rubbing someone wrong at a bar.
Why is Turkey having a hard time joining the EU? Hmmmm? One of the reasons cited is fear of mass immigration to the UK or Germany for work. There have already been two waves to Germany that upset the locals.
My work here is dung.
All they had to do was buy one billboard, now everyone in America knows about the racist ad, oh and they know about the white psp too. These guys really know how to get the bang for the buck in advertising.
Jeebus. There are three ads:
* White woman over black woman.
* Black woman over white woman.
* White woman and black woman on equal footing.
Everyone can't stop talking about the first and ignoring the others. And what are they ignoring the most? They're all hot.
>What do you think about this latest in a long line of PSP ads of questionable taste?
I think it worked. We are discussing the PSP now and talking about an ad most people here wouldn't know about if it weren't so 'controversial'.
One, it isn't in the US. 2 you need to lighten up, sure racism exists, but its a video game advert and guess what, in another on it shows the black person on top of the white... I don't see what the big deal is personally, but I guess that is how I was raised, with quite a few good friends who are of different races. Check out The CAD newspose for an insightful post on the subject, as well as the pictures of the different ones, including prior art for a DS :P
Disclaimer: I am Canadian from a small border town near Niagara Falls.
--Valthan
If the media would stop magnifying everything different between blacks and white, then this crap wouldn't be perpetuated. Black, white, who gives a shit. Just enjoy the ad for what it is... it's cool. I don't believe that the creators want to string up blacks and start slavery. This is just ridiculous. Move on with your lives people.
http://religiousfreaks.com/Have a look at Nintendo's work: http://www.ctrlaltdel-online.com/images/news/ds_ad .jpg
Seriously though, I think Tim's article on the whole issue covered this pretty well (currently on the front page of CAD).
I'm sure Sony know's what it's doing. Get people talking about the PSP, doesn't it? Besides, how many people aren't going to buy a PSP because they're offended by this? I highly doubt the thin-skinned politically correct crowd is much into gaming anyway. Still, I'm not sure what the appeal of a white handheld is. I'd be much more inclined to buy the black version if it was the same price. I don't know why, but I find black a much more asthetically pleasing color for my hardware than silver or white.
Taking guns away from the 99% gives the 1% 100% of the power.
A US outrage at an advert in Holland is no different to the Muslim outrage at depictions of Mohammed in European newspapers.
Yes, it deliberately uses the contrast of the women's races as a metaphor for the difference between the available colours of the PSP. And yes, the white woman is acting aggressively towards the black woman.
But acknowledging their races, even pointing it out deliberately and using it as a marketing gimmick, is a long way from racism. It's not as if people are supposed to walk away from that ad thinking that the white PSP is better because it's associated with white people. It's not using stereotypes or ridiculing the black woman in any way. It's just saying "hey, here comes the white PSP and it's going to take the world by storm, and here's a picture to grab your attention". With, of course, the added bonus that it gets lots of media attention for causing controversy.
Not everything involving race is racist. Too many people forget this and seem to want to make race a taboo subject. That's ignorant in itself.
Bogtha Bogtha Bogtha
This ties in with a discussion I had with a friend recently (you know a discussion is going to be interesting when it starts with the question "do you have any interest in BDSM?"). Anyway....
I think the racisim here is in the minds of the watchers. Would this be racist if it was a black woman and a white man? Would it then be sexist if it was a white man grabbing a white woman? In a full on dom/sub relationship it makes sense for the sub to do the dishes and house work and other such things, so if the sub is a woman, that fits with the "standard sexist gender roles" right? What about a master slave relationship? Is it somehow bad for a black woman to want to be the slave to a white master?
Whats worst, a black person being a willing slave to a white person, or trying to tell that same black person what they can and can't do in the confines of their life and sexuality?
This is all silly. The knee-jerk racism reaction is ridiculous. Isn't the whole goal of tolerance and antiracism to teach us to see people as people rather than black people and white people? Black people have as much right to be submissive as a white person if thats what they want!
-Steve
"I opened my eyes, and everything went dark again"
americans are way too sensitive to racism these days
In a world without history, this ad would be meaningless. But we live in the real world, that has a bloody history of slavery, apartheid, jim crow, fascism, and colonialism.
And as such, this ad is incredibly problematic. Anybody who doesn't recognize at least that is ignoring history itself.
Incorrect. The success of an add is if the sum is equal to the numbers you are adding together.
What do you think about this latest in a long line of PSP ads of questionable taste?
I think thousands of people now know PSP is coming in white... mission accomplished. If you don't like the ad, don't talk about it.
Um let's look at this one.... ..... ... ...
Current PSP comes in black only....
New white PSP is coming out....
Sex sells
Attitude sells
Lets mix black, white, sex, and attitude in one commercial
Instant racism. Now that's synergy of ideas working for you.
Am I the only one who thinks the ad is just plain stupid looking? I don't get how that conveys "white PSPs are coming". Mostly it just looks like some bad soft-BDSM.
Tom
Someday, I'll have a real sig.
I'm not saying that this should be censored. It shouldn't.
But this feels like trolling -- deliberately saying or doing something controversial, to draw attention. And trolling is lame.
If they choose to open this door -- to associate an electronic device that has nothing to do with race with all of this ugly history, just to be titilating -- then they deserve whatever they get.
Is it sexist that the don't make a pink version, or is that homophobic today?
...Or is all this a big fuss over nothing, and a lot of free advertising for Sony?
Would it be more or less racist to deny the brown woman her right to choose to be paid to appear in the ad?
Should I be boycotting both versions of the PSP, because I'm a nudist and I fnd the clothing in the ads offensive?
A pizza of radius z and thickness a has a volume of pi z z a
> the success of an add is whether or not it propts you do buy the product
Ad success is partially determined by whether it sticks in your head or not. Oftentimes it's too hard to determine if a particular ad resulted in a sale. This is because there's a time lag between when you see the ad and when you purchase. So they usually measure ad effectiveness by your ability to recall the ad after varying periods of time. So if you remember the ad two weeks from now, then they'll call it a success.
However, the ultimate purpose of all advertisements is to make you have a favorable attitude towards a product or service. So a particular advertisement, even if it's offensive, can be a success if it gets your attention, but you eventually forget about the offensive ad but remember the product in a good way.
However, it's been found that if you don't like an ad, you will associate negative feelings towards the product. Thus, there is such a thing as bad publicity.
The other spots put the ad in context, but I suspect they were created just for the purpose of having plausible deniability -- "Hey, we're not being racist! Look at the other spots [that you wouldn't have noticed before if we hadn't had the offensive version shown first]". However, I don't their intention was to be racist, but rather to be controversial (like the old Benetton ads). Sony was hoping to get tons of inevitable publicity from a racist ad, but they had the other two produced to shield themselves from the inevitable fall out.
It's important to remember that any major corporation (or political entity, for that matter) carefully scrutinizes every single element that goes into an ad photo. They hire psychologists for the sole purpose of this.
Like the old Simpsons episode, if you want advertisements to go away, stop paying attention. Just don't look.
Insert simplistic political, ideological, or personal proselytization here.
Whoo, signature!
DesireCampbell.com
They are linking the colours of the PSP to race therefore it's technically racist; equally regarding both skin colours involved (see how I got my point across without using the W or B words?).
Sony will obviously be aware of this, which is why they have done it. The simple fact is that I have seen that advert now, which has made me think about a PSP and the fact there must be a white model coming (meaning there must be a black model already out) and I would probably never have seen that advert.
It's called 'marketing'.
I'm from the Netherlands and I'm not too happy some Californian assembly speaker is judging our culture with his prejudices. I doubt many of my fellow Dutch citizens would consider the ad racist, including my non-white fellow citizens, so he's basically stirring up a racial issue where there is none.
Slashdot social media options: AIM, ICQ, Yahoo, Jabber and Mobile Text. Why no MySpace?
But this feels like trolling -- deliberately saying or doing something controversial, to draw attention.
Oh, absolutely, this is a troll. All ads try to draw attention; this one tries to do it by shocking the viewer.
The gaming industry probably is due for an explosion of ads. It makes a lot of money, and yet the commercials I see very occasionally are running on kids' shows in the afternoon or something. If Nintendo's really trying to blow the market open and appeal to something beyond the usual gaming market, you'd think they'd want to run some prime time ads.
This is also, like beer, one of the industries that can be free wheeling with its ad strategies. Airlines can't advertise with much humor or self-deprecation without taking a big risk, so you get classy commercials -- "Rhapsody in Blue" and that United livery airliner backlit by the sun, you know? Whereas beer can be funny in offhand, goofy ways and take some risks.
I betcha we get more of this style of ad. This one is past what the U.S. would tolerate, but trolls, as John Dvorak or any sports columnist can tell you, get the eyeballs. They work.
"Fundamentalism" isn't about divine morality. It's about human authority.
Is the ad potentially racist?
yes.
However racism depends on sevreal factors for recognition, to someone insulated or otherwise un-exposed to a diversity of cultures on a personal and frequent basis such an ad would be unlikely to convey any racist undertones to them.
Racism greatly depends upon historical perspective. Without a history of oppression or ill-will surrounding race semi-fresh in the minds of the viewers it would be very difficult for any given imagery or prose to evoke such a moniker.
However, in the ad we have a white woman all decked out in white mencing a black woman in black, attached with "white is comming" as a slogan. Intentional or not, satire or not, literal or not, product advertising or not... it carries obvious racial unertones.. even if its creators have no recist intentions, it is almost blatantly made in a manner delibratly based upon racial issues or at the minimum a HUGE leap of total ingnorance to the world we live in.
Of course the intentions are all the more obvious by the markets they have decided to place it in, as the non-US release clearly indicates they knew just how the US (with a much more diverse population, and more open race relations issues) would react.
Bottom line is, the ad puts a black person in a position of total infiriority to a white person, with a tag line that emphasizes that aspect.
Its inflamatory at best.
As a note of intrest there are the other two images, which "balence it out"...
* White woman over black woman.
* Black woman over white woman.
* White woman and black woman on equal footing
But of course this is pointless, the other two images have little to no relevancy in the worlds current climate of race relations. (of course if we had a succeeding couple hundred years of black oppression of the masses, and subsequent social revolution... the situation would likely be just as inflamatory in the opposite direction).
The real issue here, is such an advert reinforces negative stereotypes and relationships in our still healing society. While subtle it would serve to influence our children giving them (children of all races) cause to somehow believe just a "tiny" bit more in white supiriority, seeding racists, low self esteem, etc...
Until the rifts between under-represented and marginalized minorities and the power wielding majority (still overwhelmingly white - and largely male) are diminished, such forms of "advertising" will remain bad mojo.
--Idiots, Every single one of YOU, A flaming mass of conglomerated morons, hey wait a second, isnt that how RAID works?
Black woman over white woman? RACISM! Oh wait, it's only racism if it's the other way around.
That's because black people haven't used white people as SLAVES. It's not about racism per-se, it's evoking the memory of slavery and humilliation of black people in the past centuries.
"Honestly, look at how racial diversity is crammed into everything. You almost never see an advertisement that doesn't include a black person or an asian person right up there with white people."
i ling.html
Let's see here:
- How many female, non white in congress ?
- Any female or non white President yet ? don't think so.
- How many fortune 500 CEOs are female or nonwhite ?
- How many major metropolitan media are owned by female, nonwhites ?
- How many females in the Supreme court ? or lower court?
- How many nonwhites is anchoring for a major news network?
Stop belly aching - racial attitudes are real and still persists.
They are perhaps not overt, but still present.
Check out the site below for some glass ceiling charts based on EEOC data:
http://www.80-20educationalfoundation.org/glassce
Travel to a country like Brazil where centuries of mixing have
produced a wide range of skin colour and you will feel a very different
attitude. It's not better, just different.
because as much as I do like the pictures, since they seem like a mixture of sex and beauty to me, but the fact is most folks still live with a tribal mindset that screams, "Look, it's racism because my primative preconceptions say so!" Thusly, it will be read as racism rather than an attempt at art meets commercial in advertising. But this is not the only black/white ad I remember coming out of a japanese console maker. I believe there was once a TV ad that had two guys, one dress in a white gi and the other in a black gi fighting in midair, where one was defeated. Usually it was a random rotation between the white gi dude beating the black gi dude, and then vice versa. I don't remember hearing about anyone crying fowl on that commercial.
:)
What has to be understood the colours black and white in the asian culture represent a dichotomy of forces rather than ethicities. So, when a person from the isle of Nihon looks at the picture, they're reminded of old Zennist mythos. Or a person from China proper will be reminded of the stories by Lao Tzu about the Tao and so forth. So, in reality, this is not an intended racist grab, but rather a vast gap, in my evil evil opinion, between cultures. It's sad really, because in our culture, we're still tribal as ever yet claim to be oh so intelligent. I suggest folks consider deprogramming themselves of such preconceptions by atleast getting a wider cultural background (or read Rand's essay on the origin of Racism, which is very intriguing.).
-- Attis
In the town of Elsemere, Delaware, a local politician named John Jaremchuk recently proposed (local ordinance 447) that brown people (specifically, people of hispanic appearance) be required to carry papers proving citizenship, and that anyone (regardless of actual citizenship status) who could not produce such papers would be fined $100.
My daughter looks hispanic (though she's not) and she doesn't even *HAVE* citizenship papers. Neither do I, but I'm pasty white, so I get to go anywhere I want without question.
The proposal was defeated, but Jaremchuk has considerable local support... especially among the police and the anti-hispanic vigilante types who like to cause trouble in the low-end housing where there's a high percentage of illegal aliens... Jaremchuk is a rising star in Elsmere politics, and his entire platform is thinly veiled, weasel-worded white supremacy (he'd probably say "traditional cultural values" and "equality").
Elsmere also has the distinction of having the strongest curfew laws on the East Coast, but the curfew is only enforced on brown kids, as far as I've seen. We live less than ten miles from Elsmere, which is NOT below the Mason Dixon line - this is the industrial northeast of the USA here.
If you think color-line racism isn't alive and growing in America, you are living a very sheltered life. The 9/11 atrocities have proved the perfect wedge to drive racial profiling back into the mainstream of acceptability; in fact Ordinance 447 mentioned 9/11 specifically as justification.
The ad isn't racist, nor are the people looking at it. The ONLY people that seem to be racist are the hyper-sensitive Americans looking at the ad and applying their own screwed up values to it.
I see the ad as potentially racist, while I personally I don't see racism. The ad provides insufficient context, which leaves it to the individual viewer to create context. Those who have experienced racism, or have been consistantly exposed to the images of racism may fill in different context than somebody who has not experienced such things. People in the US can accept the images of a black player hitting a white player, or vice versa, in the sports arena because there is context, ethnic identity is trumped by team identity in the mind of the viewer.
I'm sure the image of a white man standing with his foot on the back of a prone middle eastern man would evoke responses in certain communities.
People in different parts of the world with different histories can look at the same image and interpret it differently.
D6 63 0D 70 89 81 BB 8E 7B 7C 5F 5D 54 EA AB 73
Ouch, I'm rather late on this, but...
Has anyone asked a black person how they feel on this? As far as I know, the only people who get agitated over racism are white. I don't know any black people that would consider this racist (especially since there's two more ads, one with the black over the white, and one with them together).